User blog:John Pan/L-34
The Consortium High Command looked at the AC-130 obliterating armored vehicle columns as if they were paper targets and said. “Heck, we'd love something like that!” Coincidentally, people from Da-Feng Kinetics, Advanced Ordinance Singapore and HAL were sitting at the meeting as well. Three years later, that dream became a reality. As of 2033, the IPC operated 32 of these pylon-turn gunships. 1 AIRCRAFT Main Armament The L-34 is a modified U-34 cargo jet, which in turn is a modified HAL-278 commercial liner. Being the size of a Boeing 787 (actually, the -278 was an economy-modified 787( this time, the Asians bought the design, thank you)), DFK and AOS had plenty of room to stuff in lots of goodies for the Air Force to raise merry hell with. First a SABR AESA. Then weapon-guidance LADARs. Then IR detection arrays. Then two AOS 40mm Gatlings, a L/39 203mm howitzer, and an EMP firer. AOS 40mm Gatling The AOS 40mm Gatling is the same monster found on the L-31, the CM-4, CM-5, XCM-13, and ACIWS. On the L-34, its mounted with its own oil-cooling mechanism, allowing the gun to be tuned up to 4,200 RPM. It draws from a 1000-round magazine an can spit out shells out to ten kilometers from 10,000ft. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries L/39 203mm The L/39 203mm Howitzer is the same weapon found on the CM-8, except that its barrel has been cut short and a muzzle suppressor has been added. It can fire HEAT rounds as well as Preformed Fragmentation ammunition on targets 30 kilometers away. 120 rounds are stowed internally. EMP Firer To deal with enemy communications and to provide excellent electronic warfare capabilities, the L-34 can be fitted with an EMP firer that extends outside the aircraft, then fires its pulse at a target. Electronics within a kilometer of the pulse have to have their fuses replaced, and L-34 crews love using it before they start raining steel. Upgrades A) Shriken AAM The Shirken AAM was developed out of an air-launched anti-missile missile requirement. Although it has the same exact 5-inch/127-millimeter tube as the Sidewinder, it has fins that completely fold into its tube, making it's stowage space see a steep decrease. The Shriken uses an IR Seeker, an ECCM suite, a 20-lb small warhead, and a vector-thruster-equipped rocket motor that can propel it to a maximum of eight kilometers. This makes it lethal against enemy missiles. The L-34 can carry twenty of these missiles in two separate wing-mounted pods. Armor The L-34 has Kevlar-reinforced Carbon Composite hulls, which makes it able to shrug off 35mm AAA fire. In addition the L-34 carries a full multiband radar jammer, multi-point IR detectors, wavelength analyzers, DRFM jammers, IR dazzlers and electromagnetic wave interference devices are all standard. An ACATS suite is also implemented, able to blast incoming rockets and missile out of the sky before harm can be done- a very important feature when operating at just 1,000 ft. Propulsion The L-34 uses two license-produced General Electric GEnx-1B64 turbofan engines. They provide the L-34 with enough thrust to carry its cache of weapons as far as 4,000 kilometers then return back to base- external fuel tanks are carried to compensate for the increases weight and drag. Maximum speed is a measly 600mph, but hey, it's a converted cargo jet, whose bones are commercial. Category:Blog posts